Armed with her camera, Emmy Andriesse (1914-1943) travelled to the places where Van Gogh had lived and worked. The centenary of her birth led the Van Gogh Museum to present her exceptional photographs in the exhibition The World of Van Gogh: photographs by Emmy Andriesse. The exhibition of photographs by this pioneering photographer from the first half of the 20th Century was on show at the museum until early October. The Van Gogh Museum was able to draw entirely on its own collection.

Shortly before she died, Andriesse completed the photo series The world of Van Gogh: She travelled to Provence and Auvers-sur-Oise in France. There, she captured on her camera the subjects Van Gogh had painted and drawn over sixty years before. Like the painter, she was interested in simple people and ordinary life. ‘The result is a series of wonderful photographs in the spirit of paintings and drawings by Van Gogh, which above all showed Andriesse’s own strength: her ability to capture the world around her in her lens at the right moment. The photographs show how Van Gogh continues to inspire artists after his death’ says Director Axel Rüger.

Emmy Andriesse trained during the ‘New Photography’ era of the 1930s. Pioneering photographers discovered the camera’s own language, with which they depicted objects in surprising ways: through extreme close-ups, strange perspectives and an emphasis on materials. Andriesse developed her own style within this context. She had a strong interest in socially engaged subjects, as shown for example in the famous photographs that she took during the Dutch ‘Winter of Hunger’ (1944/1945). She always wanted to portray the ordinary man as honestly and respectfully as possible. That certainly also applies to The World of Van Gogh, her last photographic series.